


Professional Help

by quantumducky



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Canonical Character Death, Gen, friendship speedrun: nearly die and get framed for murder together edition, season 2 finale, with their powers combined they have one entire fight/flight response
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-28
Updated: 2020-11-28
Packaged: 2021-03-09 20:27:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,081
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27762241
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/quantumducky/pseuds/quantumducky
Summary: Before destroying the web table, Jon calls Melanie to let her know she was right about the woman she saw not being Sasha James. This changes some things.
Relationships: Melanie King & Jonathan Sims
Comments: 20
Kudos: 198





	Professional Help

Melanie King was a woman with basic common sense, which meant that when she received a call from a number she’d never heard of before, she ignored it. If it was anything she actually cared about, they’d leave a message, right? It became significantly  _ harder _ to ignore when the same number called back again. And again. It didn’t look like they were planning to stop any time soon. On the fourth attempt, she finally picked up with a deeply suspicious, “Hello?”

“Melanie.” The voice on the other end sounded on the verge of a nervous breakdown. “You were right. I’m sorry.”

“What? Who  _ is _ this?”

A slight pause. “Oh. I-it’s Jon- Jonathan Sims. From the-”

“Magnus Institute, I know. Right.” She waited a second, but he didn’t say anything else. “Were you planning to explain what the hell you’re talking about, or just- say some cryptic nonsense and hang up on me? Because if this is a, a prank call or something, I  _ really _ don’t have time for it.” After their last interaction, she had only the barest sliver of patience left for this man’s bullshit. If he didn’t say something that made sense in the next thirty seconds, she might just hang up on  _ him. _

“Yes, sorry, I- Sasha.” He took an unsteady breath. “You were right, it’s- the woman you saw… it wasn’t her. It’s- there’s something- something pretending to be her. This isn’t a joke, I swear,” he added hastily. “I can show you the statements. Or- well. Someone can. Maybe… maybe not me. I- I’m going to try to destroy it.”

Melanie didn’t know what to say to that except another incredulous,  _ “What?” _

“It  _ killed _ her,” he said defensively, which didn’t clear things up nearly as much as he seemed to think. “And I’ve bought an axe. Did you know you can just-  _ buy _ an axe? Just walk into the shop and get one and, and they won’t even question it?”

“Wh- of course you can buy an- okay, hold on. Start over. From the beginning. What happened?”

So Jon told her. Ironically, he wasn’t nearly as good at  _ telling _ stories as he was at convincing other people to give him theirs, but there were really more important things to worry about right now than his constant tangents and inability to keep events in any kind of order that made sense. He told her about the “Not Them,” a supernatural creature that killed people and took over their lives. How it only left one person with intact memories of the victim, and in Sasha’s case, that appeared to be her.

“Can- can you tell me?” he asked, voice shaking. “What she looked like?”

Melanie swallowed. “I’ll tell you later. After it’s dead. Keep talking.”

The thing was bound to a table, he said. He knew where it was. That was what the axe was for. If he destroyed the table, he was pretty sure the Not Them would be destroyed as well. He’d already sent his assistants home for their own safety in case anything went wrong- a move which admittedly earned him some points in Melanie’s book. Not that he wasn’t still in the red for being a pompous ass, but at least he wasn’t also a careless one.

“Okay,” she said once he was finished explaining. “Does this… Not Sasha thing  _ know _ you’re trying to destroy it?”

“No, I- I don’t think so, at least. I haven’t seen her- it. I haven’t seen it. I don’t think it’s seen me. I’m in my office, the, the door’s locked.”

Melanie made a sound of acknowledgement. “Great. Stay where you are and I’ll be there in, oh, half an hour.”

“…What?”

She snorted at his clear shock. “Come on, d’you really think I’m letting you try this alone? I’m a  _ professional, _ Jon.”

“A professional… ghost hunter.”

“Don’t give me that tone. You  _ are _ the one who called me.”

“Right, apologies. I’ll just stay put and wait for the Ghostbusters to arrive.”

“Shut up,” she groaned. She’d walked into that, but that didn’t make it any less irritating. “Don’t make me regret helping you.”

There was a pause. “I do… appreciate it,” he said quietly. Seemed like it took a bit of effort to make himself say it, but at least he was trying. “You- you don’t have to come. I wasn’t calling to ask for help, I just… I wanted you to know. In case I…”

She cut him off before he could get emotional on her- not that she’d mind seeing it, if only because he seemed like the type who thought he was above the whole concept of feelings, but there really wasn’t time. And she didn’t want to think about the possibility that he wasn’t entirely confident about his chances of surviving the thing she was, in fact, about to do  _ with _ him. “Well, too bad, I’m coming whether you want me to or not. I…” Her voice lowered a bit. “I  _ liked _ her, you know? Sasha. She was… she didn’t deserve that. You can’t tell me you have a way to kill the thing that got her and then try to stop me from helping.” When he only hummed in agreement after a second of silence, Melanie started to feel embarrassed. She cleared her throat and tried to put on a more professional tone. “I’m leaving now, I’ll text you when I’m there. Try not to do anything stupid in the meantime?” He stammered something affirmative, and she hung up.

* * *

An hour later, Melanie was standing next to Jonathan Sims in the Magnus Institute’s cursed item storage room. She hadn’t been able to argue him into giving her the axe, so she was keeping watch near the door to make sure they wouldn’t be caught while he sized up the creepy table. Her fingers itched to get a closer look at the dozens of supernatural artefacts surrounding them, but she knew better than to go touching things in here  _ well _ before Jon’s insultingly unnecessary lecture on the subject.

“All clear?” he stage-whispered over to her, hefting the axe in his hands.

She poked her head into the corridor one last time, then turned around to watch the action. “Yeah.”

He nodded without looking at her, keeping his intense focus on the table, and swung the axe over his head before bringing it down with all his strength. It stuck in the table, but didn’t break it. He struggled to pull it back out, and Melanie was already striding over there to slap his hands away before he could knock himself over with the effort and smash an evil vase or something.

“Oh, for- give me that.”

“Hey! We  _ agreed- _ you’re supposed to be watching out for people.”

“What are you even going to do at this point if someone  _ is _ coming? Stand in a corner with your hands in your pockets and start whistling? Throw a tablecloth over the axe and hope they don’t notice anything?”

“This is Artefact Storage,” he protested. “I could tell them the axe just showed up there on its own and it would be completely plausible.”

She planted her feet and yanked the thing out of the table with a grunt of effort. “Whatever.  _ You _ go watch the door, if you think it’s important.  _ I’m _ going to destroy this damn table.” She got another swing in before he pushed in and took it back out of her hands.

“It’s my axe,” he muttered. This time, he managed not to get it stuck in the table… although Melanie didn’t think it really counted, because as he started to pull it out, the whole thing finally split in half and the axe fell to the ground with it in a pile of wood splinters.

“There’s nothing inside,” she noted uncertainly. “I mean, unless you count all the… old cobwebs.” She kicked at the mess, and he made a noise of disgust. “I was hoping for a little more… anything?”

“Maybe… maybe that means it’s dead. The, the power it had is gone.”

Entirely too close behind them, there came a weird, echoing laugh. Jon froze in place, while Melanie shouted and lunged for the axe. A tall, slightly odd-looking man was leaning against the wall.

“That was very stupid,” he informed them. He seemed more amused than anything when Melanie brandished her weapon.

“Michael,” said Jon, so at least she knew the creep’s name now. “What do you want?”

He raised an eyebrow. “There’s no other way out of this room, you know.”

“What?”

Melanie gestured aggressively to both of them, fortunately  _ not _ with the hand holding the axe. “What the fuck is going on?”

Michael turned to look at her. “Oh, hello! I haven’t met this one before. You’ll have to introduce us, Archivist… if you both survive.”

“What are you  _ talking _ about,” she demanded. This time, she  _ was _ gesturing with the axe.

“You don’t have time to escape before they get here.”

Jon inhaled sharply. “The… the Not Sasha? No, but- the table…”

“Was binding it quite effectively,” Michael finished.

“Oh. Oh no.”

_ “Jon,” _ Melanie hissed.

He glared at her, but only kept it up for a second before he dissolved into pacing the small space, tugging at the ends of his hair and repeating “no” to himself. So  _ he _ wasn’t going to be any help. Great.

Michael continued. “Even with all the protections you have on, I doubt you can survive them now.”

Melanie cast her eyes around the room for something that might be useful as a weapon, but it wasn’t like  _ she _ knew what any of it did. It wasn’t exactly  _ labelled, _ even if she could think clearly enough to use it. In the distance, but nowhere near distant  _ enough, _ an inhuman voice called Jon’s name. Melanie swore loudly.

“Look, Melanie, it- it wants me, I- you can- it might… ignore you. You could go. I, I wouldn’t blame you-”

“Like hell,” she snapped back.

“You have a chance,” he insisted, almost desperate.

“Not a chance worth leaving you to  _ die _ for!”

“So you’d rather we  _ both _ die, is that it? T-this is my fault, I- I was the one who, who thought this would  _ work-” _

“And I didn’t see anything wrong with it. Believe it or not, Jon, I can make my own decisions!”

He groaned, though it ended up as more of a panicked keen, burying his face in his hands. “I didn’t  _ say _ you couldn’t, I, I just, I can’t-”

They were interrupted by the creak of hinges as a door opened. A door that, only a second ago, hadn’t been there. Michael smiled at them with a sweeping “you first” gesture.

“You,” he announced, “need… a  _ door.” _

“No,” Jon said immediately. Melanie didn’t know what exactly this Michael person was, but she wasn’t inclined to trust him, either. “No, I, I just… I need…” He glanced around the same way Melanie had done, but he didn’t seem to come up with anything, either. The Not Sasha called to him again. It was noticeably closer this time.  _ “Shit.” _ He kept looking between Michael’s door and the  _ regular _ door and Melanie, and it looked like he might genuinely be too afraid to think through his options. Well, Melanie would prefer if he didn’t die here of indecisiveness. She grabbed his arm and pulled him through the door to the sound of Michael’s smug laughter.

* * *

They stumbled out into a dark corridor, and it wasn’t until Melanie put a hand on the wall to steady herself that she realized the walls were  _ stone. _ “What the hell is this?” she whispered to Jon. “Where’d he send us?”

“The tunnels,” he whispered back. “Uh- there are tunnels underneath the Institute.”

_ “What? _ Seriously?”

“There’s a trapdoor in my office that leads down here, actually.”

“How come  _ I _ didn’t know about this?”

“Well, I suppose that’s the sort of thing you don’t learn, when you’ve decided the Magnus Institute isn’t worth your time, isn’t it?” She hit his arm lightly, and he made a quiet sound that might have been a laugh, though it was strained. “Come on, we should… we should hide. Try to stay quiet. The- the Not Sasha, it… it knows about the tunnels. It might already be down here.” He reached for her hand to pull her into an offshoot even darker than the larger tunnel it branched from, and he didn’t let go again afterwards.

She didn’t pull away, either. It was good to be absolutely sure she hadn’t lost him down here. “We should look for a way out.”

He made an uncertain sound. “We might run into it.”

“We might stay put and get killed  _ anyway. _ At least if we keep moving we’ll have a chance to  _ escape _ before it finds us.”

“…Yes. Yes, y-you’re right.” He took a breath. “God, I’m an idiot.  _ Why _ did I think that would work?”

She gave him a look. “If you’re an idiot for that, so am I.”

“Well…”

_ “Shush. _ Quit talking, you’ll get us found.”

Jon opened his mouth to say one more thing, possibly out of spite, but they both froze when the Not Sasha called out,  _ much _ too close. Jon moved first and dragged Melanie with him, pressing his back to the nearest wall, both of them trying not to breathe too loudly. It moved past without noticing them. Maybe. Hopefully. Neither of them risked speaking for a while.

“…Are you  _ filming _ this?”

Melanie defensively put her non-axe-holding hand over the buttonhole camera she was, in fact, wearing. “I mean, not like I’m getting much down here in the dark, but… yeah. What about it?”

“Oh- no, no, I wasn’t- it’s just…” He fumbled an entire tape recorder out of his pocket. “I’m… I’m recording, too.”

“Oh.”

“I just thought- you know, if… if we die here…”

“Don’t say that,” she hissed. “… But, yeah, that’s… kind of what I was thinking.”

“I found tapes with Sasha’s voice on them. The- the real one. So if we’re-  _ replaced, _ then hopefully…”

“Yeah. And if it  _ doesn’t _ get us, and we’re just so lost we never make it out of here anyway, then someone in the future will find your tape and know what lost idiots we were. Where the hell  _ are _ we right now?”

He winced. It was too dark to actually see him, but Melanie could  _ feel _ it. “I… I’m not..  _ entirely _ sure?”

She sighed. “Great. In that case, how do we even know we’re not just walking  _ towards-” _

_ “Jon… Come out, come out, wherever you are…” _

Shit. Fuck. It was so close. They were going to  _ die. _ They ducked around a corner, but the thing’s voice echoed around so much, it was impossible to tell whether they were hiding or putting themselves right in front of it. Melanie gripped the axe and looked around wildly. Who knew if she could even hurt it, but if it was going to kill her either way, at least she wouldn’t die without putting up a fight.

_ “It’s okay, Jon, it’s Sasha. Reliable old Sasha. Nothing to be afraid of…” _

Jon gripped her arm and pulled her vaguely towards him, but she couldn’t tell if he was trying to hide behind her for dubious protection or get her behind  _ him. _ She liked to think he wasn’t actually stupid enough to put himself in front of the person who actually had a  _ weapon, _ but fear was known to do things to a person’s brain. (The same went for herself, but she decided to ignore that part for now.) She reached back and pushed him firmly against the wall, just to be safe. 

_ “You seem stressed, Jon. You’ve been under a lot of pressure. You should talk about it. Have a real good chat. You like talking, don’t you, Jon?” _

Jon tried to back away, but he didn’t know which direction ‘away’  _ was. _ He took a step, only to realize that left him slightly further from Melanie and shuffle back so that they were once again nearly pressed together.

_ “I’m going to wear you, Jon. I’m going to wear everything you are. Like you never existed. No one will even know. And it will hurt. Oh, yes, it will hurt. It hurt Sasha.” _

Jon’s grip on Melanie’s arm tightened and tightened until finally, at the mention of Sasha, he snapped. “Shut up,” he burst out, and clapped a hand over his mouth too late.

_ “There you are.” _ It was right in front of them.

“Fine,” Melanie shouted in what she hoped was the general direction of its face, swinging the axe wildly. “Come on then, I  _ dare _ you!” Luckily for her, Jon still had a firm grip on her arm when he turned around and started running for his life.

It was hard to keep track of things for a while- just a blurred-together montage of panicked fleeing. They ended up shoved together in a tiny alcove, hoping against all odds it would be a good enough place to hide. Jon, at least, seemed to have given up on actually getting away, and Melanie had to admit she didn’t have the energy to run much further. If they were found again, that was it. Honestly, it felt like the Not Sasha already knew  _ exactly _ where they were. It just wanted to play with its food a little longer.

It knew they were close by enough to hear the monologue it was giving them, at least. Well, giving  _ Jon. _ He was its actual target, after all, though it was more than a little amused to realize Melanie was also there- the one person it left to remember the real Sasha. “Once I kill  _ you,” _ it informed her, “no one else will know she even existed.” Melanie bit her lip and forced herself to stay quiet.

Jon was… he wasn’t doing well. Huddled against the wall, whispering frantic apologies to both Melanie herself and his tape recorder. She didn’t have the heart to shut him up, not when she was sure they were going to be found soon with or without the extra sound leading it to them. She could barely hear him, anyway, over her own pulse in her ears drowning out everything beyond her panic. He only stopped when it was suddenly there, right in front of him, and he stopped breathing altogether in sheer terror.

_ “Found you.” _

There was nowhere to run, and the sight of the horrible thing so close made Melanie forget how to move. A distant, idiotic part of her was annoyed that it was still far more interested in Jon than in her- not that it mattered, when it was going to kill them both equally anyway. It loomed over them with its awful stretched-out face, and then-

Then the walls moved. Melanie didn’t quite understand what she’d just seen, but there was no other way to describe it. The tunnels closed in, and the Not Sasha was gone. They stared at each other, shocked speechless, and then turned in unison at the sound of approaching footsteps. An old man walked up to them, carefully closing an even older book.

He looked at Jon. “Mr. Sims?”

“…Yes.”

“And you are?” he asked Melanie.

“Uh- Melanie King,” she answered guardedly. “Who are  _ you?” _

He ignored the question and gestured for them to follow him, looking mostly at Jon. “I think it’s time we had a talk.”

* * *

The man, apparently, was Jurgen Leitner- a name that meant little to Melanie, but quite a lot to Jon. They interrogated him back in the relative safety of Jon’s office. It was… a lot to take in. Sasha was really gone, not even a body left to bury. Jon had accidentally joined some kind of eldritch cult, and the woman who previously had his position had been murdered by her boss. When Jon stumbled out for a cigarette to settle his threadbare nerves, Melanie followed- she didn’t smoke, but the fresh air might help. As fresh as you could expect in London, anyway. She waited to try talking to him until he was leaning against the side of the building, looking slightly less likely to have an immediate breakdown compared to a minute ago.

“D’you think we can trust what he says?”

Jon shook his head, exhaling. “I… I don’t know. He, he could be trying to- I just don’t know.”

“I guess we’ll have to figure it out.” She tried to give him time to calm down, but she was feeling pretty impatient to get back to, you know, doing that. “Ready to go back in?”

“Yes. I, I think. As ready as I’m going to be, at least.” He put out his cigarette and led the way back to his office. “Sorry,” he said as he opened the door, “I’ve been quit for five years now, but-”

Melanie nearly walked into him when he stopped dead on the threshold. The room was covered with blood. Leitner was slumped over Jon’s desk with an axe stuck in his back.

“Oh.” Jon sounded like he was about to be sick. Melanie understood the feeling. It was so- so much, too  _ familiar. _ “Oh, god, what…”

“Fuck,” Melanie breathed. She backed up, shaking her head. Everything had gone sort of fuzzy. Jon caught up with her halfway down the corridor, and they both ended up on the floor, sitting against the wall. She put her head between her knees until she could see clearly again and looked up to find Jon staring back at her, as pale and horrified as she must have seemed herself. “Someone-  _ killed _ him,” she said flatly, trying to wrap her mind around the reality of it.

He nodded. He was looking through her more than actually  _ at _ her. “I should- I should- report it. The police…”

“What? No.” He looked at her blankly. “No, you- Jon. A man was killed  _ in your office _ with an axe  _ you bought.” _

“…Oh.  _ Oh.” _ His eyes widened and focused on her face. “I see.”

“And if anyone knows I was with you…”

He pushed himself to his feet a little unsteadily and started to pace. “Then- then what do we  _ do?” _

“What makes you think  _ I _ know? This is your fault,” she decided. “You figure it out.”

“I, I didn’t  _ ask _ you to come!”

… Damn it, he was right. Melanie made a frustrated sound and stood up as well. “Okay, just- first step, let’s get out of here before someone else comes by and finds us.”

“Right.” He stopped and took a deep breath. “Right. I… I think I know where we can go.”

* * *

Georgie was surprised, to say the least, when she opened her front door to see the two of them and their hastily packed bags. Melanie’s face was… intense… and Jon hardly looked at her before glancing behind himself again with a hunted expression. “Uh… hi,” she ventured. “Melanie?  _ Jon? _ What are you doing here?”

Suddenly, Jon was giving her his full attention. “Georgie. We- we need to- can we come inside?”

“It’s sort of urgent,” Melanie agreed.

“Okay?” She stepped back and opened the door wider. “What’s going on, though? Jon? I haven’t seen you in-  _ years.” _

He sighed and rubbed his face, slumping against the wall just inside the door. “It’s… it’s a long story, I’m not sure how to…”

“Not  _ that _ long, really,” Melanie interrupted. “We’ve been framed for murder.”

She blinked at them both. “You… what?”

“Well, mostly Jon, but I was with him at the time, so... If you’re thinking this is some insane bullshit, don’t worry- I completely agree.”

Georgie stared for a second. Then she said, “Okay,” and started moving to lock the door and pull curtains over all the windows. “Sit down, both of you,” she added halfway through. “You look like you’re about to fall over.”

They were comfortable on her sofa soon after, while she found somewhere to store their things and, hopefully, them. They sat in an exhausted quiet until the Admiral wandered in, at which point neither of them could resist making little noises to encourage him to come within petting range. The cat sniffed Melanie’s outstretched hand, rubbed his head against it once, and then left to twine his body between Jon’s legs, because he was a traitor. The mood was somewhere approaching relaxed by the time Georgie came back. She stood in front of Melanie and Jon and folded her arms.

“Now, I think you’d better tell me the full story.”

**Author's Note:**

> i just think they should have been friends..!
> 
> might add another chapter to this at some point or make it part of a series or smth but for now it works as it is


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